Article Summary:
When Nest Protect detects emergency levels of smoke or carbon monoxide (CO), the Nest Thermostat can automatically shut off your system to help protect your home and the people inside.
The Emergency Shutoff feature lets Nest Protect tell your Nest Thermostat that there's an emergency in your home. During an Emergency Alarm caused by CO, the Nest Thermostat will shut off your heating system for safety if it uses fossil fuels (such as gas or oil). During a smoke Emergency Alarm, the thermostat will also shut off fan-based systems to prevent the smoke from spreading further.
What's required for Emergency Shutoff?
Emergency Shutoff is based on the type of system that you enter during thermostat setup. Shutoff for smoke is only available for forced air systems, and won't be available if you have a different system type, such as hot water. Shutoff for carbon monoxide only works with systems that use gas, oil or other fossil fuels. So if you have an electric system, it won't be an available option in the Nest app or on the Nest Thermostat.
Emergency Shutoff relies on an active Nest Account that has both a Nest Protect and Nest Learning Thermostat. It also requires your home to have a working Internet service and Wi-Fi connection to both your Nest Protect and Nest Learning Thermostat. The signal is relayed over the Internet and can only work if the Internet and Wi-Fi in your home are working. So if your Wi-Fi network goes down during an alarm, Emergency Shutoff will stop and your thermostat will return to your regular temperature schedule.
Accessing the Nest Protect from the Nest app or the Web >
When will the heating or cooling come back on?
- After the smoke is all clear and the temperature has returned to safe levels, your thermostat's schedule will resume automatically.
- Once CO levels have returned to normal and the Emergency Alarm has stopped, your Nest Thermostat will automatically resume your regular heating or cooling schedule.
- Your thermostat will maintain your Safety Temperatures even during a smoke or CO emergency. So if the temperature inside your home drops low enough during an Emergency Alarm to reach your Safety Temperature, your Nest Thermostat will override the Emergency Shutoff and restart heating to help protect against burst pipes. Since Emergency Shutoff and Safety Temperatures work together, make sure that your Safety Temperatures are enabled and set to the temperatures you want.
How do I disable the Emergency Shutoff feature?
By default, Emergency Shutoff for CO is ON and Emergency Shutoff for smoke is OFF. You can turn Emergency Shutoff ON or OFF with the Nest app or on the Nest Thermostat.
On your thermostat, go to SETTINGS and select the EMERGENCY SHUTOFF option.
In the Nest app, tap the menu button, tap Settings, select your home, and tap Home Options.
Note: Emergency Shutoff will be disabled when your Nest Thermostat has been manually set to AWAY mode or is in Auto-Away. This is to help prevent damage from extreme temperatures if there's no one home to silence a false alarm.
What are the differences between smoke and CO shutoff?
The table below outlines the similarities and differences between CO and smoke Emergency Shutoff: how it works and what it can do in different situations.
Important information about Emergency Shutoff for carbon monoxide
Since Nest has no way to tell if your furnace was the source of your carbon monoxide Emergency Alarm, you should not rely on this feature instead of consulting a professional technician to determine the source of CO. Emergency Shutoff is not a substitute for getting out of the house immediately and remaining outside until the alarm has cleared or emergency service has arrived. If carbon monoxide alarms persist, you should investigate the reason by contacting a qualified technician.
What should I do if carbon monoxide is detected in my house? >